RECAP: Citrix Synergy 2016

Recap of the Citrix Synergy 2016 which took place May 24-26 in Las Vegas, NV.

It has been a tumultuous year for Citrix; with a huge internal reorganization including the appointment of a new CEO and putting the focus back on the core services. The competition is getting more aggressive and the pressure was on Citrix to deliver what is expected from the leader in enterprise mobility and applications delivery: INNOVATION!

Citrix, YES

Citrix wants to lead customers to say “Yes!” to innovation and productivity in the workplace.

First Synergy for the new CEO: Kirill Tatarinov

Kirill Tatarinov was appointed CEO of Citrix back in January and was previously working as Executive Vice President of Microsoft’s Business Solutions division. He has been kind of a ghost since his appointment but aimed to use this event as his welcome party.

Former CEO Mark Templeton loved to show new technologies during his keynotes, but Kirill has a completely different approach with a more business-oriented presentation. Less geek-stuff and more high-level strategies and business talks. Actually Kirill did only one demo – Skype for Business – which was a total disaster.

Mr. Tatarinov gave a lackluster performance but let’s give him time to make his mark.

twitter Quote Kirill

Microsoft + Citrix

The biggest announcement of the week, the partnership with Microsoft was taken to the next level with the 2016 edition of the Synergy. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella made an appearance during the 1st keynote to talk about the partnership.

Citrix is going to offer a “Windows 10 Desktop as a Service” on Microsoft Azure which is possible for the first time ever, thanks to a change in the licensing from Microsoft.

The awesomeness of the Day 2 keynote

After the first session far from meeting our expectations, all eyes were on the second session starting with Tim Minahan, Senior VP and Chief Marketing Officer at Citrix who gave the Innovation Award to ArcaContinental. Then he introduced Bill Burley, Corporate VP and GM Workspace Services who used the word “Awesome” way too many times. Bill talked about innovation a lot with Secure Browser, XenMobile, Sharefile. Citrix aims to deliver best graphics for everyone, secure federated identity for any infrastructure (converged, hyper converged and cloud).

They also managed to finally make the Skype For Business demo work, cutting various network connections while maintaining a Skype video connection. Impressive.

The highlight of this keynote was – again – Microsoft with Brad Anderson, Corporate VP, Enterprise Client Mobility (@InTheCloudMSFT) at Microsoft. Citrix wants to deliver customers, value with Microsoft products (Windows 10, Office 365, Private and Public Cloud and mobile).

Secure Browser

Secure Browser allows remote access to web and SaaS applications from the cloud (or on-premise) with zero end point configuration, the app is launched from the cloud or datacenter and opens up a Receiver for HTML5 session inside the user’s preferred browser.

Management & Analytics System

NetScaler MAS is an orchestration, automation, visualization and analytics platform for application delivery services. It abstracts infrastructure deployed in data centers and hybrid cloud environments into a set of resources that enables agile IT for application delivery services. For agile IT, NetScaler MAS provides tools to insert NetScaler load balancing in the development environment consistent with the production environment, supports containers and micro-services and allows app developers their dedicated view of the app-centric infrastructure. This provides continuity across Dev and Ops reducing IT administration complexity which accelerates application development/deployment. For traditional IT, NetScaler MAS allows network ops teams to scale application delivery services, dramatically simplifies troubleshooting through actionable insights.

CPX

NetScaler CPX is a NetScaler in a container form factor. It is built out of the same code base as the traditional NetScaler ADC. It runs on a Linux OS and is packaged as a Docker container.

Limited availability on 5/24/16

General availability on 6/30/16

HDX Proxy

HDX Proxy is now Free

up to 500 users

Citrix Cloud

Previously Citrix Workspace Cloud.

Apps and Desktops service is now XenApp and XenDesktop Service

Secure Browser is now Secure Browser Service

Mobility service is now XenMobile Service

Secure Documents service is now ShareFile

Lifecycle Management Service is now Lifecycle Management

Smart Scale “VDA power management” service

Automated upgrades and updates

Workspace Automation is now IoT Automation

Labs

Citrix offered Instructor-led Learning Labs scheduled on Sunday and Monday before the Synergy.

The Instructor-led Learning Labs workshop package included up to three labs on various topics for only 99 bucks.

Citrix User Group Community

Even with an incredible growth, Citrix did not feel like putting the community in the spotlight this Citrix Synergy. Shame on you Citrix… shame on you! Hopefully, They will put more effort in the CUGCs next Synergy.